


Losing Her Edge

by bardsley



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-29 21:35:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20089123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bardsley/pseuds/bardsley
Summary: Brienne wonders if she has gotten too old for this gig.





	Losing Her Edge

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ashling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashling/gifts).

The knight was small, but she was fast too. There had to be some trick, Brienne thought, to light armor that she had made for her. Brienne aimed a strike for the girl’s shoulder. It wouldn’t hit anything too damaging, but it would hurt and Brienne was getting frustrated.

As Brienne moved in close, the young knight slammed the hilt of her sword into the place where Brienne’s breastplate meat the chainmail beneath it. Tears came to Brienne’s eyes and she staggered.

“I’m sorry, Serr! Are you alright?” the young knight asked. Her voice had grown soft and girlish. More difficult than teaching any fighting move she could think of was training these young women to think like a knight.

“You do not apologize to your opponent!” Brienne barked.

“Yes, Serr,” the young knight agreed. She did not argue that this was a training exercise and Brienne was her teacher, not her real enemy. Her tone and the sympathetic expression on her face did that for her.

Brienne accepted the voiced obedience and ignored what went unsaid. It was something that she had learned to do since becoming the head of the King’s Guard.

“Good work,” Brienne said, nodding to the young knight.

“Thank you, Serr!” she said with fair more sincerity. She bowed as Brienne began to leave.

As Brienne passed by, she saw Pod--Serr Poderick, she corrected herself--standing in the doorway. He was very carefully not smiling.

Brienne nodded to him and went on her way. She hoped that he would have the sense not to follow her. Or at least, if he had to follow her, that he would have the sense not to talk.

“It was the armor,” Pod said, falling into step behind her.

Brienne heaved a sigh. She couldn’t help it, even if it made her ribs ache.

“That is generous of you to say so, but I do not believe that I asked your opinion,” Brienne said. It could have been the armor, she thought. It could have been, but it probably wasn’t. The truth was that she was getting old. The new recruits couldn’t _all_ be getting faster.

“They get it made special, the ladies,” Pod said.

“They would have to,” Brienne said. Back when she had started, the only reason she had armor is because she could fit into a set made for a man. The kind her young student had been wearing was very different.

“They are here because of you,” Pod said, doggedly. “They want to learn from you.”

Brienne rubbed her side. She allowed herself that show of weakness in front of Pod. He had earned her trust that much. “It seems I taught her a little too well.”

Pod shook his head. “Not that. How to be a knight. Not just fighting. I think we both know that fighting is the least important part of being a knight.”

Brienne felt her face heat. She carefully kept her back to Pod. “I do not believe that the king, whom it is our duty to protect, would consider it an unimportant part of being a knight.”

“Yes, ma’am, of course.”

“Which is why it will be your duty to handle the more physical aspects of training from now on,” Brienne added. She turned around in enough time to see a smile broaden Poderick’s face.

“Yes, ma’am.”


End file.
